Joined: Wed May 25th, 2011, 17:35 GMTPosts: 4333Location: .....down by the river

I would define it as trying to get a rise out of people.

- i don't see how defending Dylan on a Dylan related web-site would constitute trolling....Constantly denigrating him on that site is another matter, though.....i would put that in the "trolling" category.

Last edited by Queen Anne Lace on Sat June 16th, 2012, 23:29 GMT, edited 1 time in total.

MMD has written some great posts about this and he's tried looking at contemporary Dylan's songwriting through what he called a critical, historical approach (he's a teacher, so he knows more than just Dylan, charles!). And he was just getting started, so I wish he'd come back and expand upon his arguments.

MMD wrote:

For me: Love and Theft -- I think there is something happening with this album, with Masked and Anonymous, with Chronicles that doesn't just invite, but requires a kind of critical, historical approach. The longer I think about it, the more I think there is something going on on a grand scale. Not in all the songs, but in the best ones (Mississippi, Floater, e.g.) I think I see it in a couple places on TOOM, but it comes together on LT.

He invents a new method of writing -- complex allusions to and quotation of high and low culture, building on the shifting narrative position of the BOTT (Tangled up In Blue) and Desire period but pushing out beyond it, beyond narrative altogether -- to replace his lost early "channeling" of songs. He says he can't do "that" any more, and it's obvious. But this starts to look like a full-fledged method and style rather than the random tossing together that people say it is.

And the material, the building blocks with which he is writing are mythemes (phrases, voices, personas that are foundational to America) rather than stories in the traditional sense. S0, two lines here, four there, certain key phrases. In this sense, the same American-mythical elements that are there in the the early Guthrie 60s, still there in the Blonde on Blonde Beat/Surrealist style, and in the amazing combination of those in the Basement Tapes (JWH) period, and even in the Pat Garett to Desire Period, those mythical elements are now distilled, even abstracted, and shorn of narrative. They are left to create meaning in relation to one another. But in a way that requires historical, cultural knowledge (or else research).

Meaning is now created by suggesting relations between the big myths of America (rugged individualism, reinvention of oneself, the frontier), the idea of end times (that American apocalypticism), and the ways these are expressed in American literature, film, music -- high and low culture-- and the way all of this relates to classical sources, old empires.

That is, the more I listen and trace out the literary and historical references, the more Dylan seems like a great American thinker, a great American artist -- a Twain, a Poe... or a Delillo)

I know that some people think this style is just laziness and thievery. That seems absurd to me. It's just too shot through with self-awareness and obvious textual and historical allusion. And, that argument feels like the voice of the petty-bourgeosie. Like intellectual property is the absolute and art emerges from it. Rather than a way in which art (and some artists) make a buck (which I know Dylan has made plenty of). Again, I don't care about the accountants. And I know there is no moral argument there. No one is losing money because Dylan is quoting/parroting Timrod or a Japanese novel. To make that a moral issue is to have been fully conditioned by capitalism's lawyers.

And I know there are people who can't enjoy it because his voice is shot or they are not interested in the (allusive, historically referential) musical styles (or the fact that his bands don't always play those styles in an inspired way). But again, I am seeing this (as is my professional weakness) as text. I am enjoying the text and the performance as part of the text. His singing style is a perfect performance of the anachronism at the core of the project.

Now, me...? I love the sound of a lot of the songs on the album. Despite knowing that they are not necessarily amazing musically (in a technical sense). For instance, I know Lonesome Day Blues is not original and there are lots of blues musicians who play those licks and that style better (and are more "authentic") but I love the hell out that song. It makes me happy. Not just that style, but that performance on LT. And the references to Huck Finn (e.g.) and the old-fashioned singing style make me happy, make me smile, make the experience rich for me.

And finally, there are those who object to the very idea of approaching the music this way. I've read at least of couple of posts here recently about claims like I've made here (in a very provisional and rough way, mind you) being "pseudo-intellectual". This is not "pseudo"-intellectual. It is actually intellectual. And that may not be of interest to you, but I think it is of interest to Dylan in a certain way.

I think he sees himself as part of American literary culture. And his themes, his style and his material put him right in the mix. He doesn't fit into the avant-garde of music or literature or poetry. I don't think he is academic in that way. He's too unlettered for that. But that happens to also be very American. And he clearly has immersed himself in and now embodies decades (even centuries) of American thinking and art. In that sense, he is like an old scholar, a cultural museum. So, there's no escaping that.

So, I guess I am saying that Love and Theft is the better album to me...because it more fully realizes this new project in Dylan's work.

Last edited by Giada on Sat June 16th, 2012, 23:27 GMT, edited 2 times in total.

You rather see that Bob stops writing poetry because you and some other people noticed he quoted what somebody else had written before? You want t stand beside him and tell him what he an write and what he can not write? That is what it seems to me? You can not just enjoy poetry or songs but you have to analyze to any priceI say let the bird fly and let the poet be free to to write what he pleases? In. A way it would be more fair if somebody sued him so he could get. Defend himelf but this constant picking on him never ends I would welcome a lawsuit for him to get it out of the world once and for all. What do you want him to do? Apologize to you?

Nobody wants him to do nothing. People are pointing things out, nothing more. If it doesn't interest you, don't read it. Nobody said he cannot or should not, the only ones offended are those saying he does not. Those also seem to be the ones who have never really looked into the matter, or else they would understand.

Joined: Tue December 14th, 2010, 14:22 GMTPosts: 32764Location: out on the end of time

Giada wrote:

MMD probably just got tired of being compared to Weberman after trying to understand your arguments.

Edit: that was a response to JP's free research comment, not to ontherun.

Not that it is any of your business, but we worked that one out. Apart from that, what does my free research comment have to do with MMD? I was referring to scottw. People will get there, I'm sure.... might take a couple dozen years, though.

I have a real interest in Dylan's writing practice (and the possibility of it being plagiarism) and I have enjoyed scottw's work.

I would like to know how scottw arrives at the claims he makes about Dylan's "borrowing". There are obvious cases of borrowing (if you'ld like to call it stealing fine - for now) in Dylan's work. But there are other cases where scottw (in the book discussions thread, e.g.) finds words that are commonly used, and phrases that are commonly used (sometimes cliches) and seems to treat those in the same way as an obvious quote/lift from, say, Huckleberry Finn or Call of the Wild.

I'll say this, I do have actual skills in literary criticism and in textual scholarship. And I am not convinced that there is real rigor involved in this. All of it may be true, but there has to be some discussion of methods and some baseline definitions.

Does scottw have an understanding of literary and artistic practices? What differentiates a coincidence from an allusion or quote and plagiarism?

Until then, it's just speculation and poking around in the dark.

That said, I have enjoyed the works that scottw has done on his blog.

Last edited by MMD on Sun June 17th, 2012, 00:50 GMT, edited 1 time in total.

Much that Dylan appropriates is outside copyright but much still falls within: song lyrics and fiction remain in copyright for 70 years after the writer's death, and such living writers and songwriters as Rodney Crowell, Henry Rollins and Peter Guralnick would surely be aware of their tunes or lines turning up in Dylan's writings.

Yet as far as I am aware, there have been no claims made against him (apart from an admitted hoax in the early 1960s and a dubious claim, since dismissed, about Dignity).

From this I gather that:

(a) the writers whose work Dylan quotes consider it "fair use", and I don't think an outsider can accuse someone of plagiarism if the creator of the original work doesn't regard it as such;

(b) that they have been compensated, and have presumably agreed not to be credited -- the one exception I can think of being "My Wife's Hometown" which shares its credit with Willie Dixon (who I believe sued Led Zeppelin for plagiarism and whose estate might be as protective of his copyright as he was); or

(c) that these writers are all in the process of bringing litigation but haven't quite got round to it yet.

Of these, (c) seems the least likely and (b) the most, or a mixture of (b) and (a).

People are still free to disapprove of the technique. But if issues of plagiarism are not raised by the writers whose words have been taken, then I can't see how plagiarism can be said to have taken place.

Of course, there are the many long-dead writers who cannot be consulted, but one presumes that Dylan would have approached them if they had been alive, and they would probably have responded much as their living colleagues in letters. If one dug his heels in and refused to give permission, then I guess those words would not have been used. We have no way of knowing how many song have been shelved for this reason.

This is a technique that Dylan has always employed, though its use has clearly become more pronounced in recent years, and he also seems more intent on drawing attention to it - hence the title "Love and Theft"; the blatant use of other writers' scenes in his own life story, and the recent Asia Series art show, its paintings all taken from photographs, the catalog essay written by Richard Prince (an artist currently defending himself against plagiarism charges) and a phantom painting on the gallery's web site taken from Life magazine rather than from life.

The value of this technique seems more worthwhile discussing than whether it is plagiarism or not.

People are still free to disapprove of the technique. But if issues of plagiarism are not raised by the writers whose words have been taken, then I can't see how plagiarism can be said to have taken place.

dont confuse folks with the truth. the entire post was beautifully written.

Dylan's rampant plagiarism of recent years is mildly disturbing, but less so than the fact that he can't sing yet continues to play more and more shows to ram home that point.

I think what it boils down to is that 95% of Dylan's reputation for future generations will rest on his stuff in the years 1962 to 1975. Everything after that is required only for Dylan super-fans and obsessives, and is only to be dipped into here or there for the casual Dylan or classic-rock fan.

Therefore, all this plagiarism he's immersed in doesn't really bother me, in that it's mainly from a period of his career, which -- while interesting and decent/brilliant, depending on your perspective -- is largely irrelevant to his future (or really, his present) legacy.

Dylan's rampant plagiarism of recent years is mildly disturbing, but less so than the fact that he can't sing yet continues to play more and more shows to ram home that point.

I think what it boils down to is that 95% of Dylan's reputation for future generations will rest on his stuff in the years 1962 to 1975. Everything after that is required only for Dylan super-fans and obsessives, and is only to be dipped into here or there for the casual Dylan or classic-rock fan.

Therefore, all this plagiarism he's immersed in doesn't really bother me, in that it's mainly from a period of his career, which -- while interesting and decent/brilliant, depending on your perspective -- is largely irrelevant to his future (or really, his present) legacy.

you got it sideways, the obsessives are the ones all up in his case. us regular music lovers just go with the flow.

artists are influenced by everything around them that makes an impression, everyone is. dylan is being incredibly honest- he is showing us how artists work. he has taken some lines, from a book for instance, that he thought would somehow contribute to the effect in his song. his song was something new- it was not a song about japanese gangsters, but even if it was, he would tell it in a new way.

you either tell your story well, or you don't, and he can tell it like no one else. sometimes it might be all intuitive, the muse, or whatever you want to call it. sometimes he is trying to point as closely to the source as he can get. but that's a funny thing, where the origin is can be hard to say sometimes. dylan has been so honest about all of this, and if i was an artist that had influenced him in a good way, i would take that as an honor. he knew people would be tracking it all down- he pointed the way- love and theft (oh, i see voice with restraint wrote about the title, it is hard for me to read all of these, that is why i try not to write long ones, like this. sorry if i said the same thing as others). and everything about his stage performance contributes to the love and theft idea for me, his costume, his mannerisms on stage, lighting, and yes, the way he sings- i love it.

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